


Old-Fashioned Remedies

by brynnmck



Category: due South
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-09-17
Updated: 2007-09-17
Packaged: 2017-12-14 18:04:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/839787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brynnmck/pseuds/brynnmck
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i> Ray was just trying to figure out how much lighter fluid it would take to get the coffee table going when Vecchio came shivering and stamping his way through the front door.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Old-Fashioned Remedies

**Author's Note:**

  * For [catwalksalone](https://archiveofourown.org/users/catwalksalone/gifts).



> Written for the lovely, adorable, and in all ways wonderful [](http://catwalksalone.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://catwalksalone.livejournal.com/)**catwalksalone** , who gave me the prompt: "a Ray/Ray interlude with a hot-water bottle."

Ray was just trying to figure out how much lighter fluid it would take to get the coffee table going when Vecchio came shivering and stamping his way through the front door.

"Kowalski?"

"Nnnnr," Ray answered, which was the best he could do with blankets muffling his mouth and his jaw clenched to keep his teeth from chattering.

Vecchio walked around the couch and stood looking at Ray with a faint smile on his face. He smelled like his ma's cooking, his cheeks were bright red, what there was of his hair was covered under a dark blue toque, and he was wearing a wool overcoat and soft leather gloves that Ray knew were fur-lined. Ray had always been a big fan of those gloves, because, hey, leather, and Vecchio, which were two great tastes that tasted great together, but now he was lusting over them in kind of a different way than usual.

"You get lonely for the ice fields?" Vecchio asked, his mouth quirked up, his breath misting in front of him. "Wanted to re-create the ambience?"

"Ha," said Ray, because adding that second "ha" in there would have used up precious air that he needed for blowing on his hands. "Heat's broken."

Vecchio sighed. "Coldest day of the year, and the heat goes out. Of course. Of course it does, because apparently one of us was a really bad person in a former life, and now we're both paying for it. You call the super?"

Ray nodded. "Yep. Said tomorrow," he explained. That had been good for five minutes or so of warmth, what with the rage and the detailed fantasies of how he was going to dump the super's ass in Lake Michigan, give him _oh it's just a little cold, Detective, you'll be fine for one night._ "Asshole."

Vecchio closed his eyes for a couple of seconds in a classic Vecchio _give-me-strength_ kind of a way, then sighed again as he opened them. "The roads are solid ice, I barely made it home. So we're just gonna have to tough it out. I take it that's all the blankets?" he said, jerking his head toward the lumpy bundle of cloth that Ray was currently huddling in the middle of.

"Yeah." He was also wearing three shirts and one of Vecchio's sweaters, but he didn't figure this was the best time to mention that.

"Are you gonna share?"

"Maybe," Ray said. "I think my arms might be frozen in place, though, so we're gonna have to be careful, they might snap off like in _Terminator 2_ , you know, when the T-1000—"

Vecchio's eyes lit suddenly. "Hey," he said, "I just remembered something." He moved over into the kitchen, and Ray could hear the clink of the tea kettle and then the faucet running, followed by the click of the burner on the stove.

"Tea?" Ray asked. "You remembered tea? Just so you know, Vecchio, if you say the word 'bark' at any time in the next thirty seconds, you are not getting any of the blankets." Ray still had nightmares about bark tea sometimes.

Vecchio snorted. "Hell no," he said. "No, if it's a choice between icy death with you in this shitty apartment, or bark tea, I'm going with icy death, and then Fraser can come dig us out and go on the trail of our killers, and _he_ can drink the bark tea."

"Amen." Curious, especially since he'd dodged the bark tea bullet, Ray rolled up onto his knees and looked over the back of the couch into the kitchen. Now that he was standing still, Vecchio looked like he was starting to shiver, and he was holding his hands—still in the gloves—on either side of the tea kettle like it was a campfire. It looked kind of homey over there, so Ray pitched himself sideways off the couch and started shuffling toward the kitchen, blankets mounded around him.

Vecchio saw him coming over his shoulder. "Jesus," he snickered. "I'm living with the Abominable Snowman."

"Raar," said Ray, unlocking his death grip on the blankets long enough to wrap his arms around Vecchio from behind, cocooning them both. Cold air rushed in, and Vecchio's coat was cold on the outside, too, but Ray held on and after a minute or two, he could feel Vecchio's warmth seeping through the cloth against his chest. The burner underneath the tea kettle was glowing, and Ray leaned forward a little, trying to get closer to the heat.

In the process of which he sort of ended up pressing his ear against Vecchio's neck.

 _"Gah!"_ Vecchio shouted, ducking away. "Shit, Kowalski, that's assault with a deadly weapon."

"Sorry," Ray said, but he couldn't help grinning. This was nice, having someone to share the misery with. Nice enough that he leaned in again, opened his mouth and breathed on Vecchio's neck, right in the spot where his ear had touched.

It was like magic; Vecchio closed his eyes and kind of melted back against Ray's chest. "Mmmm."

Ray breathed again. And then again, this time with a brief flick of tongue.

"OK," said Vecchio, his voice getting huskier. "So maybe I won’t turn you in after all."

Ray laughed. "You're so easy."

Vecchio craned his neck around, leaned back a little so that when he spoke, his breath was hot and damp against Ray's ear. "Only for you, Kowalski. Only for you."

Hey. Suddenly Ray was starting to feel a hell of a lot warmer.

So was the tea kettle, though, which started to steam and whistle cheerfully, like it did not have the worst timing in the history of inanimate objects. Ray glared at it—first he got stuck with no heat in the dead of winter, and now the tea kettle didn't want him to get laid? Maybe Vecchio was on to something with that whole jackass-in-a-past-life theory—but Vecchio just laughed and shivered and pressed his ass against Ray's growing hard-on and said,

"Hold that thought."

Then he broke Ray's grip around him and headed off down the hallway.

He was gone a couple of minutes, which Ray spent standing by the stove and… not _pouting_ , exactly, because grizzled, street-wise cops did not pout, even if one minute they had a sexy Italian guy who could do really great things with his mouth all ready to share a little body-heat and the next minute they were standing there with no Italian guy and no body heat, due to the fact that the departure of the Italian guy had let a huge whoosh of freezing-ass air into what had formerly been a nice little island oasis of warmth, and possibly sex. So Ray was not _pouting._ He was _brooding_.

Manfully.

"Shut up," he told the kettle, yanking it off the burner.

Vecchio came back with something made of thick red rubber that was either the world's most uncomfortable-looking condom or… "A hot-water bottle?" Ray asked incredulously.

"Yep," Vecchio answered, nudging him aside to get to the kettle.

"Uh, did I miss the part where you turned into my grandmother?"

Vecchio clucked his tongue. "Watch and learn, Kowalski."

Ray shook his head, but helped Vecchio get the bottle filled, enjoying the rush of steam that wafted up into their faces as the water sloshed in. When they were done, Vecchio gave Ray a smile that Ray was pretty sure contributed to global warming.

"Bedroom. Come on."

That was the best news Ray had heard all day.

Vecchio beat him to their room by about half a second, and was already stripping off his coat, gloves, and shoes by the time Ray collapsed face-first onto the bed, holding his arms out to spread the blankets on top of him.

"C'mon," he told Vecchio, who checked the water bottle one more time to make sure it was sealed, then slid into bed underneath Ray's outstretched arm and burrowed close.

"See?" he said, tangling his legs with Ray's and holding the hot bottle between their stomachs. "Nice, huh?"

"Mmm-hmm," Ray agreed. A sweet shiver of warmth danced down his back. The bottle was a little too hot to touch, actually, so he smothered it in one of the smaller blankets and then grabbed Vecchio's hands, wrapping their linked fingers around it.

"Mmmm," said Vecchio, shuddering. " _Jesus_ , it's freezing out there."

Ray grinned. "Wow, you got some good detective skills, there, Vecchio. What tipped you off?"

"Fuck you," Vecchio shot back, but he was grinning, too. "At least I was doing something useful."

"Hey! I had a plan."

"And what was that? Wait for spring and then emerge as a beautiful butterfly?"

"No," Ray said. "Wait for you to get home, and then get you naked and blow you."

Vecchio's eyes darkened, and that was one thing Ray loved about him, he could roll with the punches. "Oh yeah?"

"Yeah. But I gotta admit, now I'm sorta starting to reevaluate, you know, consider my options, this water bottle's pretty—"

Vecchio cut him off with a kiss. His lips were cold but the inside of his mouth was all wet heat, and Ray opened wider against him, angling for more. The fabric of Vecchio's slacks was cool and soft under Ray's fingers, and the contrast was good now, with the warmth from the bottle spreading through the air beneath the blankets. The belt buckle was like a freaking ice cube, and that wasn't so good, but Ray dealt with that easy enough, sliding the belt off and chucking it behind him onto the floor. Vecchio made a growling noise in his throat and pressed closer; he was hard now, thick and solid against Ray's hip.

Ray kissed his way down Vecchio's chest, leaving damp imprints on the smooth cotton of his shirt. Normally he was all about the skin-to-skin contact—good thing he and Vecchio knew how to sew on buttons, because they'd both lost more than a few—but considering that every time he moved, a rush of cold air got sucked in under the blankets, he figured he'd leave Vecchio as clothed as possible so he wouldn't lose anything valuable. When he got to the water bottle, he wasn't sure exactly what to do with it, but Vecchio solved that problem for him, kicking it down by their feet; Ray could just barely feel it through his three layers of socks. He was completely buried under the blankets now, like when he'd been a kid reading comic books with a flashlight in the middle of the night. Only this time there was no flashlight and the air smelled like Vecchio's cologne and he wasn't the only one with a hard-on, so, hey. Score one for adulthood, no question.

He got Vecchio's slacks open and slid Vecchio's cock out through the slit in his silk boxers. Vecchio moaned at the touch, somewhere up there, and one of his hands curved around Ray's head, fingers in Ray's hair. Ray went right for the gold, taking as much of Vecchio's dick in his mouth as possible, and Vecchio's hips stuttered forward a little, then back while his stomach muscles tensed and he hissed in a breath.

"Christ, Kowalski, your nose is freezing."

Ray pulled back enough to laugh. "Sorry." He licked the head of Vecchio's dick, tasting pre-come, salt and sticky. "Want me to stop?"

Vecchio growled and tightened his fingers in Ray's hair.

Yeah, Ray was gonna take that as a _no_.

He put one hand around Vecchio's cock and the other one flat against the skin right next to it, for cold-nose-blocking purposes, then swallowed Vecchio down again, sucking hard. Ray fucking loved blowjobs, and mostly he tried to draw them out as long as possible—Vecchio shaking and swearing and begging was one of his favorite things in the world, right up there with the GTO and the Cubs making the playoffs—but seeing as these were sort of funky circumstances, plus Vecchio had come up with the hot-water bottle thing, he figured he'd give him a break. So he set a fast, steady pace, hollowing his cheeks, making up with his fingers what he couldn't quite reach with his mouth, and then after a few minutes he did the thing with his tongue that always drove Vecchio nuts and that was it, Vecchio was coming, shooting hot and unsteady down Ray's throat.

Ray licked him clean while he was still shuddering, then slid up his body to kiss him. The air was fucking freezing against Ray's hot skin, but he didn't care; Vecchio kissed so sweet after a blowjob, gentle and lazy and a little bit messy, and Ray never got enough of that, loved it maybe even more than the blowjob itself and definitely more than the GTO, though not more than the Cubs making the playoffs because that happened like once every century and Ray gave Vecchio blowjobs a couple of times a week, but still, it was definitely worth dealing with the cold. Then Vecchio held a hand up for Ray to lick, his eyes heavy-lidded but still smoldering when Ray ran his tongue over the long, slender fingers. When they were slick with spit, Vecchio reached down between them and took Ray's cock in his hand, jacked him slow and certain, still giving him those easy, wet kisses, and Ray's head started to go fuzzy, like all his blood was tangoing in his veins. He could feel the sensation gathering at the base of his spine, close, so close, and—

"Hey," he managed, because no way was he gonna want to clean up after this, but,

"I got ya," Vecchio told him, smiling softly, then ducked down under the covers and wrapped his mouth around Ray's dick just as Ray couldn't stand it anymore and let go, his orgasm rushing through him like a brush fire.

After that, it was pretty much pure hibernation instinct; they both wiggled out of most of their clothes before Ray rolled over on his other side and Vecchio spooned up behind him, one arm wrapped around Ray's chest and his—also fucking cold, thank you—nose shoved into Ray's hair, the blankets tucked as close as possible around their necks. The light was still on, but Ray wasn't willing to get out of bed for anything short of a supernova, and he'd've bet Vecchio wasn't, either, so he just closed his eyes and tried to ignore it. Wasn't like it ever got really dark in the city anyway.

"Here," Vecchio mumbled into the back of his neck, nudging the water bottle closer to Ray's feet. There was about ten seconds of sleepy maneuvering and snickering after that while they both jockeyed for their share of the warmth, then Ray sighed and settled down again.

"Light's still on," Vecchio pointed out, like he'd been waiting for it.

Ray didn't move a muscle. "Don't care."

"Kowalski, the electric bill's sky-high as it is, you wanna be working double—"

Vecchio stopped in mid-sentence as Ray reached down next to the bed, grabbed one of Vecchio's shoes, and slung it at the light switch.

Bulls-eye.

"Wow," said Vecchio after a few seconds of quiet breathing in the semi-dark. "If my shoe's scuffed, I'm gonna kill you, but I gotta admit, right now, I'm not really caring all that much."

"See?" Ray said smugly. He pulled Vecchio's arm a little tighter against his chest. "Told you I had a plan."

Vecchio snorted. "Shut up and go to sleep," he said, the smile clear in his tired-slurred voice, and Ray smiled too and closed his eyes and for once did exactly what Vecchio asked.


End file.
